This Week at Pilgrim

Monday, May 23rd @6:00 PM ... VBS Workshop in Fellowship Hall

@ 7:30 PM ... Pastoral Committee Mtg. in Parsonage

Tuesday, May 24th @ noon... Prayer in the Parlor

@ 7:00 PM ... Bible Study in Fellowship Hall

Wednesday, May 25th @ 6:00 PM ... VBS Workshop in Fellowship Hall

Thursday, May 26th @ 7:00 PM ... Choir

Sunday, May 29th @ 9:15 ... Sunday School Opening

@ 9:30 ... Sunday School

@ 10:30 ... Worship

@ 5:00 ... Cookout in Picnic Shelter

Birthdays This Week

Wednesday, M ay 25th ... Ardinus Watkins

Friday, May 27th ... Edfdie Varner

THIS PASTOR’S VIEWPOINT

Last week I got caught in a heavy shower going from the car to the house. The distance isn’t that great but the rain came down “with a vengeance,” like you’d have thought it hadn’t rained all week. None the less, I was glad to get in the house. “Ah,” I sighed, “dry shelter.”

I can also remember the last summer day I spent at the beach, when I was glad to get in out of the sun (I was beginning to get that cooked lobster look), before I did some real damage to my body.

Out of the rain, out of the sun, out of the cold and out of the heat. We have a lot of reasons to get out of the weather and into the shelter of our homes, don’t we, a place where we can always, at least hopefully, control the climate and find comfort.

It’s not always the getting “in” some place that makes us feel good, however. Sometimes it’s what we put in us that does the trick. Here again we find extremes can satisfy, such as a hot cup of coffee on a cold day or a cold iced tea on a hot day. Perhaps it’s a simple snack, just something to munch on that we want inside us while, at other times a really big meal and a full stomach is all that will accomplish satisfaction.

I thought of these “ins” when I read John 14:20 (NLT) in this week. ”When I am raised to life again, you will know that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you.” The more I thought about that verse the less important all those other “ins” seemed. The comforts they afford are only temporal in nature. You have to keep making adjustments. The food you ate for supper, no matter how filling, no longer satisfies the next morning, and you can’t stay within the shelter of a building all the time, you have to go out into the elements.

But with Christ the “in” is permanent. He is always in his Father, while at the same time, we are always in him and he is always in us. We never need to wake up with an empty feeling, and, we are always in the shelter of our Lord.

What a wonderful thought to start the week with. Isn’t God great! You might just want to take a moment and thank him. Go ahead and do it now while we’re thinking about it.

Sermon for Sunday, May 22, 2011

THE POWER OF A FOCUSED LIFE
Philippians 3:4b-14
If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put confidence in the flesh, I have more: 5 circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; 6 as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for legalistic righteousness, faultless.
7 But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8 What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. 10 I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead. 12 Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of me. 13 Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 14 I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.
Staying focused is one of the secrets of a successful life.

Just the other I went into a McDonald’s and said, “I’d like a senior coffee please…black, no cream or sugar.” The girl at the counter asked, “Would you like cream with that?” Focus!

Doctors hear some pretty strange stories in their line of work. Audiologist David Levy recalls a frantic client who lost her hearing aid. She had been eating a bowl of cashews while talking on the phone. --- Her tiny hearing aid was sitting on the table next to her. --- In the midst of her conversation, she mistook the hearing aid for a cashew and ate it. Focus!

Actor James Cagney recalls that in his day, acting was not as glamorous a profession as it is now. Actors were paid only slightly more than the average American. There were no labor laws to protect actors from long hours or hazardous working conditions. Cagney remembers that in one of his early movies, The Public Enemy, his character had to run away from an enemy who was shooting at him with a machine gun.

There were few special effects back then, so the actor used a real machine gun with real bullets. Because Cagney often played characters that were on the wrong side of the law, he was often in movies where he was shot at with real guns and real bullets. ---- One wrong move, and he would have been dead. I doubt that Cagney had much difficulty staying focused when he did these scenes.

One of the secrets of a successful life is: stay focused.St. Paul was one of the most effective persons who ever lived. Today, two thousand years after his death, his writings are being studied by millions of people all over this globe. We’re doing so this morning.

Has there ever been --- except for Jesus Christ --- a man whose thoughts have influenced more people over the generations than this tentmaker from Tarsus? One of Paul’s secrets was the power of focus. Religiously, Paul already had all the essential credentials to impress his peers. He didn’t need persecutions, shipwrecks or imprisonment to validate his standing in the religious community. He was a circumcised Jew, a member of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews.

More than that he was a Pharisee. He not only knew the Law, he practiced it fastidiously.In fact, he was so committed to his faith that he persecuted the early Christian church.

And yet, one day, he came to see that none of these things mattered in the least to him compared to his new-found faith in Jesus Christ. And thus he focused his life on this one endeavor: to know Christ.

He writes: “For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ.”

A few verses later he writes: “I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the sharing of his sufferings by becoming like him in his death . . .” Then he sums up his intent with these words: “But this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus
.” (NRSV)

That’s focus. Paul concentrated his life on this one thing--knowing Christ--and Paul affected the lives of millions of people.

Focus gives our lives power. Motivational speaker Zig Ziglar has used a marvelous image: He asks us to consider whether we are “wandering generalities” or “meaningful specifics.” In other words, are our lives focused on a few important things or do we spread our lives far too thinly?

A good analogy is that of light. Light is a marvelous thing, and it comes in many forms. But light’s focus and intensity determines its power. For instance, light bulbs generally have a low level of focus and intensity. The light rays scatter out of the bulb, creating what we call incoherent light. But take those same scattered light rays and focus them in one direction at one target, and you have a laser, which is infinitely more powerful.

St. Paul’s life had the power of a laser. Successful people have a clear understanding of what their life is about. They know where they are headed and they have made a significant commitment to finishing the journey. When comedian Jim Carrey was a struggling young actor, he wrote himself a check for ten million dollars and postdated it seven years in the future. That check kept him focused. Even more impressive is the fact that, when it came due, he was able to cover it. By staying focused on his goal, he achieved great fame and success.

A picture appeared in a news magazine several years ago. In the picture a woman was grinning from ear to ear. At age 72, she had something amazing to grin about. A few years earlier she had decided to become a mountain climber. She had never climbed a mountain before. --- “Mountain climbing is not a realistic goal,” her friends warned, but she decided to do it anyway. She was now in the news because she had climbed Mt. Everest!

There she was in all her glory, backpack and all, holding her victory flag up toward the clear blue sky. She had done it! She had climbed one of the world’s highest mountains.

Not every 72-year-old needs to set his or her sights on climbing a mountain.
For that matter, not every 22-year-old needs to climb mountains, but it is amazing what we can do when we set our minds to it.

A golf instructor once advised, “Take dead aim! Instead of worrying about making a fool of yourself in front of a crowd of 4 or 40,000, forget about how your swing may look and concentrate instead on where you want the ball to go, and you will be surprised at how often the mind will make the muscles hit the ball to the target, even with a far less than perfect swing .”

Personally, I discovered years ago, that in golf, either my mind was weak or my muscles didn’t listen.

Focus. What is it you really hope to achieve in your work life, your family life, your spiritual life? How you would like for your body to look? How you would like your resume to look? --- What are those hobbies you hope to master? Successful people have a picture in their mind of what they would like to achieve with their lives and they focus their energies on that picture. Focus is power.Of course, there are many examples of people who have focused their lives too narrowly.

There are choices to be made in life. In the same way that not everyone is wise to climb mountains, not everyone is cut out to be St. Paul.

For example, we have no record of Paul enjoying the love of a family. His passion for the Gospel was all encompassing. There was too much travel in spreading the Good News to the Gentiles --- and too much time spent in jail.

Not everyone can make that kind of commitment. Not everyone is called to change the world in the same way as Paul did. Whereas focus is critical to a successful life, it is possible to focus your life too narrowly.

They have no time nor inclination to allow room for the needs of others. If you want to pay that kind of price…you can have it. They are successful by the world’s measure, but not by God’s. And, they are not happy people.

They are successful by the world’s measure, but not by God’s. And they are not happy people, Beware of too narrow a focus. Our focus needs to be large enough to accommodate a lifetime of growth.

I mentioned actor James Cagney. Cagney grew up in a poverty-stricken neighborhood where desperate men would do just about anything to make a few bucks. Some of the tougher men in Cagney’s neighborhood turned to boxing as a way out. Cagney once painted a picture of an old boxer, a man whose body is scarred and whose mind is destroyed by repeated beatings. He titled the painting “The Victor: Chronic Progressive Fibrotic Encephalopathy,” which is the term for brain damage caused by repeated blows to the head. Cagney said, it is a picture of “the winner who loses everything.”

How’s that for graphic? The winner who loses everything. Many of us are squandering the precious time God has given us on this earth by not focusing on a few important things and doing them extremely well.

Others of us are losing eternity because we have focused our lives on the wrong things or we have focused our lives so narrowly that we have excluded those we love and God. Finding the proper focus is critical in life just as in photography.

What good is a photograph that is taken out of focus? I know, I’ve deleted many. What good is a life that is not focused on God, on those we love, on our calling as followers of Jesus Christ?

St. Paul was focused on a goal that was narrow enough that he never was distracted, but large enough so that he never became bored.

In his commitment to Christ he found that perfect balance that made his life laser-like in its intensity.

And here is the good news: IT’S NEVER TOO LATE TO FOCUS YOUR LIFE.

A piano teacher taught many students over a lifetime career, When she got them ready for recitals, she would encourage them to perfect their endings. She insisted they practice the endings over and over again.

When her students grumbled that it was boring going over and over these last few measures, she would answer: “You can make a mistake in the beginning or in the middle or in some other place along the way. But all will be forgotten when you manage to make the ending glorious.”

We know very little about Paul’s last days on earth. But we do know his ending was glorious. The power of a focused life: “But this one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the heavenly call of God in Christ Jesus.”

Amen

For the Week of May 15th.

Here's what is happening at Pilgrim

Sunday, May 15th 6:00 PM ... Youth Fellowship
Tuesday, May 17th Noon ... Prayer in the Parlor
7:00 ... Bible Study
Thursday, May 19th 7:00 PM ... Choir practice
Friday, May 20th 2:30 - 9:30 PM... Olin Mill Picture taking
Saturday,May 21st 9:30 AM - 5:30 PM ... Olin Mills Picture taking
Sunday, May 22nd 9:15 AM ... Sunday School Opening
9:30 AM ... Sunday School
19:30 AM ...Worship Service


BIRTHDAYS THIS WEEK

Sunday, May 15th ... Kaye Everhart
Saturday, May 21st ... John Ray Ward

THIS PASTOR’S VIEWPOINT

There are numerous times in all our lives when we are afraid. Fear is not a stranger to anyone I have ever talked with, well, except with one young boy in a “Time With The Children” a few weeks ago. When I asked if they were ever afraid of anything he stoutly shook his head no.

Still, the truth be told, we all know fear at some point in our lives and it’s sometimes amazing at the number of phobias there are, so many we can’t even begin to appreciate their diversity. I looked up a few and found monophobia (fear of being alone), glossophobia (fear of public speaking), taphephobia (fear of being buried alive). One can suffer from polyphobia (to have more than one fear), or opposite fears such as vestiophobia (fear of clothes) and gymnophobia (fear of nudity). If you are planning to get married you might want to get help if you suffer from pentheraphobia which is, simply put, fear of your mother-in-law.

Some fears are ancient such as brontophobia (fear of thunder and lightening), our dog Sam suffers from this phobia and ophidiophobia (fear of snakes).

There are even modern phobias that have popped up, you know, like when the SARS popped up. Some of these are electrophobia (fear of electricity), motorphobia (fear of automobiles), aviophobia (fear of flying) and in the 1950’s nucleomituphobia (fear of nuclear weapons) came into being. There is also one I suspect that affects more of us who are middle age or so, than our children. It is called cyberphobia (fear of computers) which also applies to ATM’s. I would also like to be so bold as to suggest we might create gasophobia, (fear of rising gas prices) which is a fear that many of us are struggling with today.

Of course there is always an “other side of the coin” and I was terribly relieved to come across it this week in my Bible readings. I discovered it in 1 Samuel 25:29 (NLT). “Even when you are chased by those who seek your life, you are safe in the care of the Lord your God, secure in his treasure pouch.”

If that doesn’t give you the “warm fuzzies” and boot your phobia out into the cold, well, nothing will. Isn’t God great!


Sermon, May 15, 2011

STOP THOSE TWO DEAR WOMEN FROM FIGHTING
Philippians 4:1-9
Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! 5 Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord is near. 6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. 7 And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.

8 Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things. 9 Whatever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into practice. And the God of peace will be with you.
Little Jonathan came home from the playground with a bloody nose, black eye, and torn clothing. It was obvious he’d been in a bad fight and lost. While his father was patching him up, he asked Jonathan what happened.

“Well, Dad,” said Jonathan, “You know Eddie -- that boy who’s always giving me a hard time. I challenged him to a duel. And I gave him his choice of weapons.”

His father said, “that seems fair.

“I know,” Jonathan said, “but I never thought he’d choose his big sister!”

Conflict is part of life. People get into arguments. Resentment builds. Controversy erupts. Angry words are spoken. Relationships are broken. Outright fighting may ensue. Conflict happens. Even in church. Some of you are thinking, “Especially in church.”

A cartoon showed this notice on a church bulletin board: “213 days without a split!”
Conflict happens. It even happened in the churches that bore the direct influence of the Apostle Paul. Listen to Paul’s words to the Church at Philippi, as recorded in the Living Bible: “Dear brother Christians, I love you and long to see you, for you are my joy and my reward for my work. My beloved friends, stay true to the Lord. And now I want to plead with those two dear women, Euodias and Syntyche. Please, please, with the Lord’s help, quarrel no more be friends again. And I ask you, my true teammate, to help these women, for they worked side by side with me in telling the Good News to others; and they worked with Clement, too, and the rest of my fellow workers whose names are written in the Book of Life.”

Here are two of Paul’s finest lay people and they are in conflict with each other. You can’t tell in any group of people where anger and resentment may erupt.
You may know about a deadly octopus, whose bite can kill in minutes. The bite of the blue ringedoctopus, causes blurred vision and difficulty in swallowing followed rapidly by paralysis and death. There is no known antidote.

The deadly creature, native to Australia, is only the size of a golf ball. It is a truly beautiful creature in color, but it only displays its true blue ringed colors when it is about to attack. And then it is too late.

Sometimes problems arise in the church quickly and unexpectedly. Someone says something critical. Someone else gets envious. Someone takes an unpopular position, and soon people who had been friends are at each other’s throats. And it is sad.
It broke Paul’s heart to see two of his finest lay people hurting the witness of the church because of their enmity toward one another. And so he asks other members of the church to intervene.

Every pastor has to face this kind of situation sooner or later. It is part of the human condition. The church isn’t a collection of saints, but of sinners redeemed by grace. Still, we should be able to do better.

What causes us to strike out at one another? What causes us to be envious of one another? What causes us to make differences of opinion into personal affronts? Why do we find it so hard to forgive one another?

Could it be because we have never experienced unconditional love in our lives … the unconditional love of God?

Sometime back two women appeared on the Oprah Winfrey Show. Both of the women appeared to be 40ish. They were nice looking. One was blonde and slender. The other was brunette and a little heavier. But there was a strange bond that linked the two women. You see, the brunette, heavier-set lady had killed the blonde lady’s daughter.

This sounds more like Jerry Springer than Oprah, doesn’t it? Do you know what they call guests on the Springer show? Nuts and sluts. These two ladies were neither nuts nor sluts.

The brunette lady is an alcoholic who had finally gotten her life together. But not before she had done some tragic damage to people around her. She’s a mother herself with three children. While alcohol had her in its grip, she tragically neglected her children.

Even worse, she got behind the wheel of a car one day in a drunken state and plowed into a car carrying the other woman’s young daughter and killed her. Sounds like it came off of the evening news … doesn’t it.

How would you feel toward a drunk who had killed your only daughter? How would you feel toward the person whose irresponsibility had robbed you of the one person you loved most in the world? What would you do with the grief, the anger, the rage? I honestly don’t know what you or I would do in this situation, but here is what this lady did: she forgave the woman who had killed her daughter.

She not only forgave her in her mind; she reached out in love to this sad woman who had taken her daughter’s life. She helped this woman deal with her own remorse, helped her break her dependence on alcohol, helped her take control of her life and become a loving mother and a responsible member of the community. And Oprah asked in obvious awe, “How did you do this? How did you forgive this woman who had done you such a terrible wrong?” And this nice-looking blonde lady said, “I had to.” Then she added, “Because Someone once forgave me.”

Then she added, “I have experienced the unconditional love of God in my life,” she said, “and I had to share it with someone else.”

Wow! “I have experienced the unconditional love of God.”
Have you ever experienced unconditional love? Love without strings, love without expectations, love given to you not because of something you’ve done great, but simply and solely because you are you.

This is the deepest need that human creatures have … to experience unconditional love.

You know what happens to people who do not experience unconditional love as children?All their lives they search for that love. And they carry around burning questions within their hearts. Am I worthy? Do I have any value as a human being? Could anybody ever really love me?

There are people sixty years old who are still seeking some assurance that their lives count for something. Adults with this basic insecurity act it out in different ways. Some are workaholics; some are addicts. All have difficulty with relationships.

Teenagers are not immune. Can you imagine a thirteen-year-old girl driven by this insecurity? Am I worthy? Do I have any value as a human being? Could anybody ever really love me? Can you see how easily she could be manipulated by a boy concerned only with his own needs? Can you imagine a thirteen-year-old boy with these same fears?

Desperate to be accepted, he finds friends who accept him for what he is. But there is a price for admission to the group. He must take on the values of his new comrades. Most young people who get involved with drugs do so because of a need for acceptance.

Now, listen parents. If your children are still toddlers, nothing is more important than taking time to love your children. Nothing is more important. Nothing!
Your own career is not as important. Your time is not as important. Even your own happiness is not as important. If your children are teenagers, it’s probably too late. If they’re still searching for unconditional love, they will probably resist any effort you may make to bridge that gap. Unless, of course, they are among the unfortunate young people who crash and burn. Then it will be time for all the unconditional love you can muster.

Unconditional love is the greatest need human creatures have. If we do not receive that love, we spend the rest of our lives seeking after it and there is always that lingering sense of inadequacy. This is where many of our problems begin; with a sense of inadequacy, a sense that we don’t measure up. This is the curse of people who have never experienced unconditional love.

For example, suppose I hear that you have said something critical about me. It may bother me, but I will be able to handle it, if I am secure in myself, if I have experienced an unconditional love and know myself to be a complete and worthy child of God. But suppose I have this lingering sense of inadequacy. Then the criticism has much more sting and the temptation will be to strike out at you in return.
A sense of inadequacy is the source of all envy. If I know that I am worthy and complete in myself, then I have no reason to be jealous of your accomplishments and rewards.Indeed, I can rejoice with you at the recognition that you receive.

But if I am unsure about myself, any award you win is but a reminder to me of my own personal lack of achievement. And it grates on me and might even cause me to lash out at you even though you have done nothing at all to deserve my anger.

Do you see that the way to solve the problem of conflict in the church is not for us all to take conflict resolution classes and to develop our skills at interpersonal relationships though that would not hurt.

But the greatest thing we could do to have peace and harmony in the church is to focus on the unconditional love of God for each of us and to see that where that love is experienced, there is no need for disharmony and discord, no need for envy or a critical spirit, no need for angry words and smug dismissals. As psychologist Sheldon Kopp says, “All of the significant battles are waged within the self.”

And it’s true. When people have never experienced unconditional love, they have an interesting attitude toward others: Not only can they not accept themselves, they have trouble accepting others. They’re quick to pass judgment. They’re envious. They have trouble forgiving.

It has always interested me that Jesus never called anyone a sinner. Jesus had no need to put anyone else down, condemn them, and criticize them. All of his conflicts were with the people who thrived on putting other people down.

Why was Jesus able to open his heart to all people even those who hung him on the cross? It was because Jesus experienced unconditional love in his own life. He got it from his Heavenly Father and he passed it on to others just like that blonde lady on Oprah did who passed it on to the woman who killed her daughter.

You see, unconditional love is always what God is all about. “In this is love,” says the first letter of John. “Not that we loved God, but that God loved us and gave His son for the expiation of our sins.” (4:10)

The cross is what separates Christians from Buddhists, from Moslems, even from Jews. “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believeth in him should not perish . . .” (John 3:16) Unconditional love is what God is all about.

Several years ago, there was a Dennis the Menace cartoon that grabbed my attention. Dennis is walking away from the next-door neighbors’ house, the home of Mr. And Mrs. Wilson, with Joey, his younger friend for whom Dennis served as kind of a mentor.

Both of them have their hands loaded with cookies. Joey asks, “I wonder what we did to deserve this?” And Dennis responds with these words of profound wisdom: “Look, Joey, Mrs. Wilson gives us cookies not because we’re nice, but because she’s nice.”
And that’s the Gospel. God so loved the world . . .

Is your heart filled with anger and hurt today because you have never experienced unconditional love? Are you still questioning in your heart: Am I worthy? Is there any value to my life? Could anybody really love me?

I know Someone who loves you. Could you open your heart this day and receive God’s love? Young person, don’t settle for a cheap substitute. Mom, Dad, you can’t make enough money or win enough applause to fill the emptiness in your heart. You think it’s too late for you? It’s not. It’s never too late for God. Please, stop where you are today, and let God love you.

Paul writes to the church at Philippi, “And now I want to plead with those two dear women, Euodias and Syntyche. Please, please, with the Lord’s help, quarrel no more be friends again.” Here’s what they need.
Here’s what you and I need; to open our hearts to the unconditional love of God.

Amen.

What's Happening At Pilgrim This Week

Tuesday, May 10th, 12:00 Noon ... Prayer in the Parlor
7:00 PM Bible Study - Fellowship Hall
8:00 PM Choir Practice
Wednesday, May 11th... 4:00 - 6:30 Chicken & Dumpling Buffet
Friday, May 13th ... 6:30 PM Cards in the Parsonage
Sunday, May 15th ... 9:15 Sunday School Opening
9:30 Sunday School
10:30 Worship Service


BIRTHDAYS THIS WEEK

Sunday, May 8th ... Joe Ward & Jack Shaw
Wednesday, May11th ... Dale Allen

Saturday, May 14th ... Larry Burton


THIS PASTOR’S VIEWPOINT

If you ever have to stand before the bar of justice to face any charge brought against you, from a minor traffic offence to a collection of the worst crimes imaginable, you have to go through one terrifying moment. This is when the charge or charges against you are read out loud to the judge by the prosecutor for all in the courtroom to hear. None of us could help but feel a bit intimidated, especially when we hear something like, “The State of North Carolina against (your name goes here.)” Wow, the whole State is against me?

You’ve got to admit you seem pretty small when being faced by something as big and powerful as the entire state. That, however, can pale into insignificance should you be appearing in a federal court. There you have to face the whole United States of America.

It is somewhat of a quirk, though, that should we stand and quietly listen to all the good things that someone else has done for us, we also feel uncomfortable. Perhaps we sense guilt because we didn’t thank that or those individuals enough, or worse, not even at all.

Imagine, then, that you are with an old, gray-haired man who for years was the foremost leader of your country, both political and spiritual, and he said to you, as did Samuel in 1 Samuel 1:7 (NLT). “Now stand here quietly before the Lord as I remind you of all the great things the Lord has done for you and your ancestors.”

Your first thoughts might something like, “Oh no. I’ll be here forever. I’ll never get home for the race or ballgame.” You know, the kind of thoughts you have when the pastor’s sermon seems to be a bit longer than you like.

But it’s those second thoughts that I think are even more important. The ones that make you feel guilty because you truly have not given much thought to the many blessings given to you by God, never mind going back through all your friends, associates and even ancestors.

We certainly take a lot for granted, don’t we? Good things happen and we pay them no mind as if, we are indeed, simply entitled to them.

Maybe we should spend a moment or two each and every day, quietly before the Lord, and just give thanks for yesterdays blessings while they are fresh in out minds. There really are more than we casually thought, especially if we concentrate thoughtfully and prayerfully upon them. Actually, saying “thank you” is a gift we give back.

Happeninga at Pilgrim for the week of May 1, 2011

OUR CALENDAR
Sunday, May 1st 4:30PM ... Golden Age Banquet
Monday, May 2nd. 6:30PM ... Property Committee
7:30PM Finance Committee
Tuesday, May 3rd NoonP{rayer time in Parlor
7:00 PM Bible Study Fellowship Hall
Wednesday, Mar 4th 6:30 PM Pilgrim Circle @ Pattie Leonard's house
Thursday, May 5th, 7:00 PM Choir Practice
Friday, May 6th 9:45 AM Senior Adventure to Victory Junction
Sunday, May 8th 8:00 AM Consistory Meeting
9:15 AMSunday School Assembly
9:30Sunday School
10:30 Worship Service


BIRTHDAYS THIS WEEK
Sunday, May 1st ... Johnny Jones
Tuesday, May 2nd ... Ruby Hatley & Christy Peacock
Wednesday, May 4 ...Ray Black,Becky Daley, Margaret Ward & Billy Warner
Saturday, May 7th ... Jessica Hill

THIS PASTOR’S VIEWPOINT

Not so long ago I was looking for some photographs that I have had ever since I was a child. I can’t even remember why I suddenly wanted them, but I did, and it irked me that no matter where I looked, they weren’t there.

What, I wondered, could have happened to them? This kind of thing is not, of course, unique to either old photographs or to me. We all have wondered what ever happened to this or that. Sometimes we are surprised to find the pencil we are seeking is really right behind our ear.
Go to any reunion, perhaps your high school’s twenty-fifth, or better yet, fiftieth, and you will hear “What ever happened to so and so?” “Whatever happened…” becomes a regular reunion litany.

This week my mind was directed upon the path of “whatever happened” wondering while in my daily Bible readings, which included this partial verse from Ruth 1:14 (NLT). “…and Orpah kissed her mother-in-law goodbye.” Here, in tis story, we have the two daughters-in-law of Naomi going separate ways. They made different choices.

Ruth chose to go on with Naomi, on to a strange land with different people, a very different single God, different customs and perhaps food. It was a land full of strangers that seemingly offered her little chance of finding a new husband.

Orpah, on the other hand, chose to do the smart thing. She was encouraged by Naomi to return to her people and her gods. There among her many relatives she would find succor and hope. Hope for a new husband and a secure future.

Whatever happened to Orpah? We don’t know. She was never heard of again.

What happened to Ruth, the one who chose the obviously more difficult path, the path advised against by her mother-in-law? Well, all she found was a wonderfully righteous and loving husband and the one true and living God. Her words, "Your people will be my people, and your God will be my God, (v.16b) are repeated in countless wedding ceremonies through the centuries, and she became a direct link in the lineage of our Lord Jesus Christ.

As so, one took the path of self-love and passed into obscurity and the other took the path of selfless love. Now, after thousands of years no one ever needs ask, “Whatever happened to Ruth?”

Perhaps there’s a lesson here.



Sermon for Sunday, May 1, 2011

“WHAT WOULD YOU DO IF YOU KNEW
THERE WAS NOTHING TO FEAR?”

Sermon Text: Luke 24:36b 48

Jesus himself stood among them and said to them, “Peace be with you.”
37 They were startled and frightened, thinking they saw a ghost. 38 He said to them, “Why are you troubled, and why do doubts rise in your minds? 39 Look at my hands and my feet. It is I myself! Touch me and see; a ghost does not have flesh and bones, as you see I have.”
40 When he had said this, he showed them his hands and feet. 41 And while they still did not believe it because of joy and amazement, he asked them, “Do you have anything here to eat?” 42 They gave him a piece of broiled fish, 43 and he took it and ate it in their presence.
44 He said to them, “This is what I told you while I was still with you: Everything must be fulfilled that is written about me in the Law of Moses, the Prophets and the Psalms.”
45 Then he opened their minds so they could understand the Scriptures. 46 He told them, “This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, 47 and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. 48 You are witnesses of these things.

Billy Ray and Joe Tom, two men from Tennessee, were still new to flying. But they decided to rent a plane and fly from Knoxville, Tennessee to Asheville, North Carolina. As they crossed over the Smoky Mountains, they discovered there was a problem with one of the engines, and they decided to notify the Asheville airport that they might need to land quickly.

Billy Ray nervously grabbed the microphone and said, "Thanksgiving! Thanksgiving! New Year's! New Year's! Easter! Easter!"

"You're getting there, Billy Ray," said Joe Tom. "Stop when you get to May Day. May Day."
Today is May Day, and it is also the first Sunday in May. It is interesting to note that while we are enjoying our worship service today there are young men and women in Austria running through the mountains of that land carrying torches. They do this every year on the Second after Easter. It’s called the Race of the Four Mountains. They begin with a mass on the top of Magdalensberg mountain. Then, carrying burning torches, they go over the mountains to Saint Lorenze. The race takes twenty four hours. At the end a priest waits to bless them. I can’t help but think that if most of us were to run that race, the priest would be waiting to give the last rites.

We’re told there are sections of this race that are so treacherous that the runners dare not look back. Some people in that part of Austria, are said to believe that to stop this ritual pilgrimage, would be a sign of the end of the world.

Our text for today for the second Sunday of Easter is not about the end of the world. No one’s crying, “May Day. May Day” though the Scripture says the participants were frightened.

But what they were experiencing was a different kind of fear. For the first time in human history a man had returned from the dead. His friends and followers did not know what to think. This had never happened before.

When people are in the grave they are supposed to stay there --- and yet here this man was among them --- a living, breathing person. Luke tells us the disciples were startled and terrified, and thought that they were seeing a ghost.

No wonder. The disciples were witnesses to an event that changed the world forever. We said about the events of 9-11, that America would never be the same again. Well, 9-11 was a horrific event, but there have been many horrific events in history. Many of them recently. But there has been only one resurrection of the living Christ.

Jesus says to his disciples, "Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is I myself. Touch me and see; for a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have." And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. Then Luke adds something interesting. He writes that the disciples “did not believe because of joy.” What a fascinating phrase. It was literally -- in the disciples’ minds -- “too good to be true.” They disbelieved for joy.

I wonder how many of us also regard Easter to be in that category--too good to be true? I wonder how many of us hold back from opening ourselves to the good news of Easter because our rational minds whisper to us that this has got to be mere “wish fulfillment.”

We want so much to believe that life makes sense, that life does have meaning. We long so intensely to believe that the grave does not diminish nor destroy our value as human beings, that death does not separate us forever from those we love. We want to believe that so much, that we are afraid to really think about it too much for fear that we will conclude that it is all an illusion, all a fairy tale, a myth with no basis in history. They “did not believe because of joy.”
The Reuters news agency carried an amusing story a number of years ago. Le Lavandou, a tiny town on the coast of France, had a real problem: they were running out of burial space in their overcrowded cemetery.

So the mayor of Le Lavandou, Gil Bernardi, came up with a novel idea for fixing the problem: he passed a city ordinance making it against the law for any citizens of Le Lavandou to die until they could establish a new cemetery. No matter how sick anyone was, they were forbidden to die. For longer than one would have reasonably expected, the citizens of Le Lavandou were remarkably compliant.

Now why can’t we get our politicians to campaign on a “no-death” platform? We think the economy is important --- it’s small potatoes compared to this issue.

Well, friends, here is the good news for today: death HAS been banned as a permanent flaw in the human condition. Death has been overcome. It has been trampled underfoot. No more does death hold its fearsome tyranny over our lives.

The good news of Easter is such enormous news, such mind-boggling news, that we do not give it the attention it deserves. Why not? Could it be that we, too, disbelieve for joy?

Oh, I don’t mean if I came around to each of you and asked you point blank, “Do you believe in the resurrection of Jesus?” that you would deny that you do. Intellectually, we accept it as fact. There is too much biblical evidence to deny it outright.

Rather, we disbelieve in the sense that what ought to have a critical impact on our life, the truth that life goes on beyond the grave, does not seem to impact us very much at all.

We still fear death. Don’t we? We’re still afraid of dying. And we still fear losing those we love to the tomb.

The Welsh poet, Dylan Thomas, wrote a poem as his father lay critically ill. He received the Pulitzer Prize for writing it. It begins like this:
Do not go gentle into the good night.
Old age should burn and rave at the close of day.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

His words may have impressed the Pulitzer Prize committee, but they were of little comfort to his wife Caitlin. When Thomas died in St. Vincent’s Hospital in New York City, the staff had to put her in a straitjacket, so unrestrained was her grief; and when she came to write about it, she called her book Leftover Life to Kill.

We may read these comforting stories from scripture each year at Easter time, but still there is that unrelenting fear of the grave. In Woody Allen’s well-known sentiment: “it’s hard to contemplate your own mortality while whistling a tune.” We fear death. Even more importantly, we still fear life.

Sometimes in a seminar, a speaker will ask this profound question, if you knew that you could not fail, what would you do with your life?

If you knew you could not fail . . . then people start dreaming about that business they would start . . . that hobby they would indulge in . . . that long-delayed adventure on which they would embark. If you knew you couldn’t fail, there is no limit to the things you might attempt.

But you can fail. You can fail in a business, you can fail in a marriage, you can fail as a parent, you can fail as an athlete. On and on goes the list of possible failures. There is no use asking, “What would you do if you knew you could not fail?”

However, what if the fear of failure were removed? What if you knew, deep down in your heart of hearts, that failure really doesn’t matter, that it is better to try something great and fail than to live always denying yourself that long-neglected dream?

Then you could walk into your boss’ office and ask for that raise, then you could start that business, then you could begin achieving a multitude of dreams.

Do you understand that to a certain extent this is what separates people who are super-successful from the rest of us? They do not let fear of failure defeat them.

But let’s move beyond the fear of failure for a few moments. What if there were nothing important in life for you to fear?

Nothing at all, whether it be failure or poverty, pain or loss of people you love, declining health or anything else imaginable including death? Think of the kind of person you could be, if all fear were totally and completely removed from your life. That, my friends, is what Easter is about. Easter says to us that all of creation is in God’s hands. Even that ultimate enemy of humanity, death, has been trampled underfoot by the power of Almighty God. You don’t need to fear aging, you don’t need to fear losing loved ones, you don’t need to fear the loss of your home or your source of income.

No matter what experience may come your way, what if you knew that in the end everything will work out to your best good? Wouldn’t that have an impact on the choices you would make?
That is the message of Easter. Jesus says to his disciples, "Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet; see that it is I myself.”

The Taj Mahal in India is one of the most famous and beautiful buildings in all the world. It has been described as “a shimmering, white jewel that seems to float over the hot Indian plain.” Actually the Taj Mahal is a tomb, and it tells one of the greatest love stories of all time.

“A great shah, when he was only nineteen, fell in love with a highborn beauty and married her. She gave the shah many children. She ruled at his side as an equal. He adored her and brought her diamonds and flowers. In the tenth year of their marriage, once again she was with child, but this time, something strange occurred.

She confided that shortly before the baby was born, she heard it cry in her womb--an ill omen. A healthy baby girl was born, but the queen did not recover.

As she lay dying, she whispered a final wish to her grief-stricken husband: ‘Build for me a monument so pure and perfect that anyone who comes to it will feel the great power of love.’ She paused and then added, ‘ . . . and the even greater power of death.’”

It’s a beautiful story, but the queen was wrong. Easter says to us that love is stronger than death. Love has forever conquered death. "Why are you frightened, and why do doubts arise in your hearts?”

The question is: Isn’t it time you began believing for joy? Most of you have invested many years of your life, much of your time and much of your money, in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And yet you have not taken out of the faith the one privilege that every follower of Jesus has rights to --- and that is the life-changing joy of knowing there is nothing in all the world, nothing in all the universe, nothing in all creation that can defeat you if God is with you. All these years you have denied yourself the one gift that Easter has to offer --- and that is the gift of deep and abiding joy.

The movie Black Hawk Down retells the dramatic story of a small group of Army Rangers who flew into Mogadishu, Somalia, to capture a warlord who was stealing American food shipments from the starving Somali citizens.

One of the young men whose life was changed by this brutal battle was Sergeant Jeff Struecker, who now serves as an Army chaplain. Sergeant Struecker claims that as bullets whizzed past his head and grenades exploded all around him, God called him into the ministry.

As he said, “In the middle of that firefight, I had to decide whether I believed what I say I believe. And when I finally answered that question, my faith became so strong it gave me the strength to fight the rest of the night.”

This is ultimately what all of life comes down to. If we believe what we say we believe, that Jesus Christ was raised from the dead, and that he now lives at the right hand of the Father, if we really believe that, how can we go from this place and live the same timid, tepid lives that we’ve lived in the past?

So, in the light of Easter, for just a moment, let me be the seminar leader and ask you this question, “What would you do with your life if you knew that there was nothing of which you need to be afraid?”


Amen.